British Soccer Camp returning to Ashland

Thursday

For the fourth consecutive year, the city of Ashland will host one of the most popular soccer camps in North America -- Challenger Sports' British Soccer Camp.

Challenger Sports holds more than 3,700 soccer camps each summer across the country for players ages 3 through 16.

The five-day camp begins Monday at Ashland Community Soccer Park and all the coaches involved with it come from the United Kingdom and either play or coach professional soccer.

"These guys have played soccer all their life and they do it for a living back home, so it's the next level really for them to coach," Challenger Sports regional director Dan Miller said.

There are four different sessions available for participants based on age and skill level, but Miller said the most popular is the half-day camp, which is a 3-hour-long session for kids ages 6 through 16.

"Each day is going to be slightly different and it depends on what session, as well," Miller said. "The main group, the half-day group meeting 3 hours a day, they're going to work first on ball-mastery exercises and some specific fakes and turns and moves."

"Our coaches from the (United Kingdom) are great at showing the kids some stuff they haven't seen before," he continued. "The kids will then look to go home and try and replicate that."

After the campers learn various skills from their coaches, the final activity each day is the Camp World Cup, which gives participants an opportunity to put their skills to the test against others.

"The last thing is our daily World Cup tournament where other kids scrimmage against each other using the skills they've practiced and we use that to talk to them about the World Cup of soccer," Miller said. "Each child normally represents a different country and learns a little bit about the background of a country from another part of the world."

With the camp coming back to Ashland for the fourth consecutive summer, it potentially gives children the opportunity to show how much they have improved throughout the year.

"It's a chance for us to come back to a community for the fourth year in a row and we're excited to come back and see kids that we might have seen before and how they've developed and also get a chance to meet new kids and new families from a different community," Miller said. "The standard of soccer is pretty good in Ashland and there's a lot that we can work on with the kids to take them on to the next level."

Miller said he expects anywhere from 30 to 40 kids to participate in this year's Ashland camp. Registration will remain open until 9 a.m. Monday, when the camp begins, and the cost to participate is $141 for the entire camp.

All campers will receive a free T-shirt, soccer ball, poster and a skills evaluation.

"I certainly hope that they develop their own soccer game and they come away trying to repeat some of the skills that we've shown them and they've worked on," Miller said. "Also, that they continue to play soccer and remain enthusiastic about the game. Crucially, we want them to enjoy themselves, as well."